eller...
This could, indeed, be a PSU problem, but more troubleshooting
will tell the tale, so take what I post here as a beginning
rather than an end to your answer.
As zodiacman-ga noted, all those fans pulling air into the
guts of your PC, with no filtration, tends to result in the
accumulation of massive amounts of dust. Bunnies are one
thing, but the worst problem is caked-on dust which builds
up on the fins of the CPU heatsink, having been drawn there
by the CPU fan. Additionally, the blades of the CPU fan are
typically encrusted with the dust, as well, and blowing or
sucking with a vacuum may not be adequate to remove it.
This can slow the fan and reduce airflow around the CPU,
resulting in raised operating temperatures.
I also have an Athlon home-built, and I've found it wise
to replace both the CPU heatsink and fan at least once a
year. Not doing so definitely results in higher temps, as
the air circulation around the CPU is greatly diminished.
If the fan and heatsink are still in good shape, I'll
clean them off with 90% rubbing alcohol and save them for
the next round of replacement, but most fans are made
of thin plastic which seems to break down over time and
become more fragile, so be careful of that. If a fan
starts to make noise, look for it being out of balance
due to one of the blades being malformed over time,
or even starting to break off at the base.
As to the power supply, I use the Antec brand, but
but recently, I started having a problem with the
hard drive spinning down during high activity, such
as Windows booting up. I finally located one other
post by someone with a similar problem. He also had
the same Antec PSU and used the same program I did
to monitor voltages, Motherboard Monitor. It's
available for free at the home site:
http://mbm.livewiredev.com/
MBM used to be a bear to set up for different mobos,
but now users have provided a list of compatible
boards and setup has been simplified by automatically
using the specs sent in by users. You can check for
your board in the list at the link to the left on
the main page.
MBM provides realtime monitoring of your CPU temp,
your case temp, your fan speeds, and the voltages,
assuming the sensors are available on your mobo.
What I and the other poster found was that, during
heavy use, yes, the CPU temp would rise, but worse,
the +5V supply, already lower than the +/-5% spec
given by the manufacturer, at 4.58V, would drop
even lower during heavy activity, such as a game,
when it would drop below 4.3V
+/-5% of 5V means no lower than 4.75V.
When I went to replace the PSU, I found something
horrible. I took it apart to inspect it, and if you
think the dust in your PC in general is bad, this
was just terrible. The entire PSU was filled with
what looked like the contents of a cannister vacuum.
Naturally, this can only lead to problems.
Now this is due, in part, to the construction of
Antec supplies, which is that they have two fans
on the unit. One sucks air in from inside the PC,
and the other blows out, providing excellent air
flow. The problem is, it also forces every bit of
dust not captured on your CPU fan, heat sink and
elsewhere inside your PC, and forces it through
the craggy surfaces of the PSU. And, of course,
opening it up to clean it voids the warranty.
I think most PSUs have this dual-fan configuration.
I, personally, will be opening it and cleaning it
whenever I replace the CPU fan.
So, for your situation, given the rapid shutdown
I would first check to see just how dirty the
CPU fan and heatsink are. If they're as dirty as
I think, replacing them is an inexpensive start,
for as little as $10.
Then see if you can stay up, and see if the temps
reported are lower. If so, and you feel safe enough,
check out the Motherboard Monitor site, and, if your
mobo is supported, download it and set it up to run.
Check out the readings, especially the temperatures
and the +5V supply. If they're off by more than 5%,
definitely replace your PSU, and get one that's
reviewed well in terms of providing voltages within
tolerance.
The newer Antec's have focused strongly on this, and
one of them, the TruePower, even lets you tweak the
voltages from a front-panel insert, though it's a
550W unit, and costs around $100 currently:
http://www.silentpcreview.com/article58-page1.html
SilentPCReview has some excellent reviews of recent
PSUs:
http://www.silentpcreview.com/section4.html
Last, but not least, let me emphasize that, *if*
the PSU is faulty, and your gut tells you not to
fool around, don't! If the PSU is putting out
voltages which are too high, or if it takes a
nosedive, it can definitely take out other
components with it!
My own saga ended with a dead PSU and a hard drive
that wouldn't spin up because the motor-controller
circuitry on the HD circuit board burnt out. When
I tried it with the new PSU, it wouldn't spin up,
and the circuit board got very hot, very fast, in
the area of the motor-controller circuitry on the
board. It also had the ugly smell of hot circuitry.
Whether the drive circuitry failed and took out the
PSU, or the PSU failed and took out the HD, I'll
never know, but I lost 80GB of archived freeware
that I'll never see again.
Let me know where this takes you, and anything else
you need for a satisfying answer.
Please do not rate this answer until you are satisfied that
the answer cannot be improved upon by way of a dialog
established through the "Request for Clarification" process.
sublime1-ga |
